LPFM isn't dead, it's just somewhat crippled, in a coma, and horribly disfigured. The NAB and NPR, among others, cried "Interference!" (their "examples" and "studies" are quite amusing) and bought a bill requiring interference testing to be carried out by a qualified company not associated with broadcasters or the government (which pretty much eliminates everyone). An interesting provision in this bill is the requirement for an economic impact analysis, which could be interpreted as how big stations could lose money if LPFM stations provide the content people want (it could also be interpreted as only pertaining to the impact of an increase in interference, which makes more sense). Despite these problems, LPFM interference testing is on track to take place sometime next year.
The real problem isn't the stalling (testing), but the licensing. Current pirate operators were given amnesty a few years ago if they ceased operations. Since legal LPFM isn't up and running yet (and probably won't be for a while), this amnesty period was a waste. Now, any currently functioning pirate station is ineligible for a legal license - they have no choice but to continue operating illegally or shut down completely. Groups eligible for LPFM licenses only include non-profit groups without current media ties (no small newspapers, etc.). Additional restrictions and licensing selectivity resulted in the majority of the 250 or so LPFM licenses approved so far going to religious groups. So much for general interest local programming.
LPFM was a nice idea, but it just isn't going to happen in a band populated by extremely large broadcasting conglomerates (thank you deregulation...). The spectrum belongs to the public just like the government works for the public - not much.
I tried to stay awake through the whole thing, but I failed. The swirling colors and lack of dialogue put me under right away. I just wish I had been that lucky with Insurrection, but I seem to have blocked out those memories, so perhaps all is well after all.
I'm really getting sick of the amount of computer generated effects being used in entertainment these days. The Matrix seems to be the starting point of this widespread overuse, but at least it fit with the story in that movie. Commercials for Charlie's Angels, The Musketeer, Pearl Harbor, Behind Enemy Lines, and everything Jet Li has been in lately were full of these kinds of effects, and I just don't see the appeal. Call me old fashioned, but I'll take Black Sheep Squadron's mix of stock footage, combat footage, and cockpit views over a computer generated plane any day. I liked Robert Picardo better as a singing doctor in Vietnam than as a singing holographic doctor on a starship. Large scale CG has its place in historical recreations for documentaries, but it is a poor substitute for plot and character development.
With that said, you can probably figure out how I feel about these computer generated celebrities. I'm not a big fan of human celebrities, so I'm not too excited about the CG kind. Physical presence is the one feature most "celebrities" are reduced to relying on - what will be left when that is taken away? Hopefully this "next big thing" will be the next big flop.
If you look at the past century, you'll see that athletes have used every advantage available to them to make themselves better than those who came before them. New ideas, new techniques, new equipment, new training methods, new diets, etc. The athlete of 2001 has countless advantages that the athlete of 1901 didn't have. Advances in materials and medicine alone have had a huge impact on sports. Some of these "performance-enhancing" advances (semi-dimpled golf balls, corked bats, anabolic steroids, etc.) are banned, but many others are allowed. The playing field may be mostly level at any given time, but it changes dramatically over time. Genetic enhancements, especially those that can't be detected, are just the extension of current practice into the field of genetics.
The reason why this will eventually be accepted (assuming there is no serious risk to the athlete of course) is simple - sporting events are entertainment. If records are never broken, nobody cares. In 1997, baseball was no big deal. In 1998, there was a huge peak in interest because a record that had stood for decades was about to be broken. However, frequent record breaking is just as boring as no record breaking at all, as was shown by the general lack of interest in the last weekend of the 2001 MLB season, which featured all kinds of records falling. What does this mean about the future of genetically enhanced sports? At first, people will be amazed at the superhuman feats. Then it will get boring. Finally, it will be interesting again, if anyone still cares about sports enough to participate at the media-hyped level.
...they might as well use the information they gather to set up a dating service. Think about it - the government spies on your every keystroke, but to make up for it they send the sexual partner(s) of your dreams to your door. How many people will still be complaining here after that. "Damn government helping me get laid... Oh well, gotta go, no time to bitch and moan about the complete erosion of civil liberties, I'm gonna get me some." It gives new meaning to the term "public relations..."
So now that EULA resale restrictions and message board libel are out, what's next? Will CA rule that Microsoft should be punished and not rewarded for its crimes? Will it take a swing at the DMCA? Will a massive earthquake send it to the bottom of the ocean? (Ok, so that one isn't exactly related, but it is probably just as likely...)
What do you see as being the future of digital media: a business model based on consumers having little or no control over the information they pay for and consumers willing to put up with this, or something more similar to traditional rules where a company has little control over its product once it is sold, digital or otherwise?
What's the value of the stolen goods? Revenues associated with additional IP addresses, for one. Let's say one in 10 of the 5 million U.S. cable modem subscribers are usurping IP addresses without paying the $4.95 per month fee that's typically charged (beyond a pre-specified limit, which varies MSO to MSO.) Right off that bat, that's just shy of $30 million lost, annually.
Except there aren't any additional IP addresses being used. And of course, as with most speculative damages, this fails to take into consideration the fact that many of these additional computers would not be networked for internet access at $5 per month if there were no "free" alternative available. Consumers gaining functionality does not automatically equate to companies losing profits, especially if the service offered is not the one desired (IP addresses vs. just a data pipe).
With NAT-based hubs, cable providers won't be able to see into all connected devices-making remote troubleshooting difficult-because, again, the NAT is speaking for all connected devices.
Oh no, my cable company won't be able to mess around with the equipment without my knowledge. I'm so worried.
CAT could replace NAT altogether, at least in equipment hand-picked by MSOs for home-network service packages.... At the very least, cable MSOs involved in CableHome want a counting mechanism, with parameters set by them, that specifies a maximum number of connected devices.
Um, why should my cable company be able to penalize me for having devices that aren't routinely (or ever) used for internet access? So I guess I'll need NAT in the CAT... This whole article is one big piece of misinformation and FUD. My cable company doesn't need to know what I have on my private network - they provide the pipe, I use it. They might be able to monitor some of the data that goes through their network, but anything more invades my privacy (ethical argument, not legal argument) and puts my network at risk of attack. NAT will be around until the cable companies buy a law banning it, and then it will still be around illegally.
Umm, the Internet is a public utility. Like water. It's created and maintained by your tax dollars. You do have a right to go online. Governments are not obligated to give you equipment to access the Net, but they cannot legally prevent anyone from logging on.
This is true with any government. Really. Just trust me.
Sure, I'll trust you just as much as I trust the Saudi Arabian government. Unless you have a link to the international law that guarantees the right to internet access for all human beings, I will be forced to write this off as a misguided attempt at humor on your part.
Although, this would explain a few things...
"Mr. President, the Taliban is guilty of numerous human rights violations, should we bomb them?"
"So is China, but we seem to be getting along fine with those fellows, let's just wait and see with these folks."
"Now they're destroying ancient statues of tremendous archeological and religious significance!"
"That could just be a misunderstanding, let's give them the benefit of the doubt for now."
"Oh yeah, and they made it illegal for their people to access the internet."
"What? Those bastards! Get the bombers in the air, I want to be watching stuff blow up on CNN by lunchtime."
How dare a country not give its people full access to the internet! What's next, companies that charge monthly fees for an internet connection? We will never be free individuals until every available piece of information is beamed directly into our brains free of charge!
Seriously though, instead of looking at things from the "Information wants to be free... or else." perspective, let's start with no access as the reference point. Ok, so these governments are so insecure that they don't trust their people with information about bombs or the water supply or... Oh, sorry, wrong country. Where were we? Right, Saudi Arabia and that bunch. So these governments don't like new ideas. Like it or not, these are independent entities outside the US (or whatever country you are associated with). We can't just go around trying to enforce our laws inside their borders. Wait, sorry about that, apparently we can... Ok, this is getting confusing. The point here is that if a government wants to block information from its people, that's an internal matter for that particular country. We can't force every country to allow access to all information any more than you can demand that your neighbors teach their children all about homosexuality, witchcraft, or Linux. As for American countries selling the tools to block information, they sell the tools that allow your neighbors to block similar information from their children. In both cases, these are areas outside your control, regardless of your opinion on the matter. If your hypothetical neighbors (different ones this time) were forcing their children to participate in the creation of child pornography, you can't just go over there and start beating them up - only the proper authorities can intervene. You can forbid your children from visiting them, you can stop inviting them to your backyard barbecues, and you can refuse to buy those overpriced candy bars that their kids keep selling, but that's about all you can do directly, just like the US isn't in a position to force other governments to treat their people fairly (not that this has ever stopped the US government, but in theory...) - that's a job for a global governmental body.
On the bright side, at least the people in these countries have some access to the internet. Without these "filtering" systems, there might just be a Taliban-style ban (of course, that could be on the way, but taking things away tends to upset people more than not giving them something they never had in the first place). Whether or not that is acceptable is up to the people in those countries, not us. We can't just force our way over there and impose our values on them (well, we could, but that sort of thing doesn't usually go over too well), and we can't ban companies from helping other countries do something we allow our citizens to do to people under their control (again, we could, but that wouldn't make much sense, not that export controls have to make sense). What was the question again? Was there even a point in the first place other than the whole misguided "information wants to be free" type of complaining about limiting access to information?
The IP class will "appear and disappear" under the control of some fancy router that will make the whole country appear momentarily to send/receive from the Internet, but then hide them again so that the outside world can't "see" them.
"Captain, Saudi Arabia is decloaking off the starboard router!"
hopefully soon some radically different interfaces will actually gain widespread acceptance.
There are just so many things wrong with this statement... Do you want "radically different interfaces" just for the sake of being different, or do you want them to be functional too? And of course, "radically different" and "widespread acceptance" very rarely go together. Most people accept what is familiar, so none of these new interfaces are going to take off overnight. While we're at it though, why don't we have radically different automobile interfaces, or radically different food packaging interfaces, or radically different building access interfaces?
The whole point of an interface is that it is accessible. The key here is to make it work for the users and not make the users work for it. When you start having the interface share some of the work of organizing files (as Scopeware does), you may take some work away from the user, but now you've essentially got a co-worker you need to deal with whenever you want a file. Imagine two people sharing a cubicle (yes, this is a desktop metaphor for a non-desktop metaphor replacing a desktop metaphor), using the same files and reference materials. Even if one is only tasked with organizing everything, there's still a gap between the brain of the user and the brain of the organizer. If there isn't a perfect match between how the two think, you'll hit an endless cycle of problems. The only solution is to either force the user to conform to the organizer, or customize the organizer to the exact specifications of the user. Neither is likely to be better than just giving the user the task of organizer.
All of these nifty high-tech interfaces may be fun to play with and may succeed at getting funding, but their final test is always the typical user. Now, I know the typical user is held in low regard around here (we are the elite after all, or at least we like to think we are), but at some point you have to interact with reality. The desktop metaphor just won't die for a reason - people can use it. As an IBM researcher said in the article, "We wanted to find people who didn't understand the function of file folders, how to open files, how to delete files. We couldn't find anyone." Throw some weird abstract 3-D creation at people, and some won't understand. A lot of people can't even handle the concept of multiple ways of completing a given task; increasing the complexity of the interface would actually make things more difficult for them.
The real solution to this problem won't come from the interface side - it will come from the user side. You can't design an interface until you can understand what the user wants to do. This may not be as attractive a project for venture capital, but reality seldom is. In the end, I have a feeling that there will be no general agreements between users, making a single unified advanced interface impractical.
Yet again, the solution is on the user end. The desktop metaphor is a lot more useful than many people give it credit for. For example, the paragraph describing Scopeware really describes a generic file search program that already works perfectly well in a desktop metaphor. However, expanding it to fill the entire GUI is pointless. If you want to be able to find something, just put it somewhere that makes sense. In a year or two, will you really remember what day, or even what month you last used a certain file? If you file it away in a logical place though, you can use that same logic to locate the file again. Instead of file-specific knowledge, all you need to know is how you think. Sure this requires you to think in the first place, but that is the key issue here. In any interface, usefulness will be determined by how well files are maintained by the user. The current desktop metaphor requires very little from the user, just moving files around. Linked interfaces or fancy 3-D interfaces require more from the user, otherwise there will be no benefits - you still have to create the links or move files around spatially. If managing a system of files and folders is too much work for some people, will these new interfaces be any better?
So for those of you who survived this entire comment, I will sum up how to improve the computer interface for the masses. Teach them how to get the most out of the existing interface, based on their individual needs. Learn where they run into problems caused by the interface. Refine the interface to the point where the user is truly in control and isn't restricted by how the interface thinks things should be done - leave the thinking to the humans. We don't need any fancy interfaces on a general purpose computer. And yes Apple, that means cut it out with all the prettying up/cluttering up of the GUI. Just make it work and leave it alone.
vivendisucksuniversal.com
Or, for the more creative types:
vivendisucksuniversally.com
Would non-English speakers be confused and think this is a Vivendi Universal site? And if some would be confused, would it just be really stupid non-English speakers who automatically assume that any domain containing the strings "vivendi" and "universal" must be official Vivendi Universal sites? At what point does individual stupidity become the responsibility of the individual and not the domain owner?
Microsoft is clearly the industry leader...
on
XBox Released
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· Score: 5, Funny
...when it comes to error messages. That green-on-black look alone is "hip" and "trendy," but the attention to detail shows that Microsoft has put a lot of effort into making the user's error message experience an enjoyable one. In the future, I'm sure we can look forward to more "dynamic" and "interactive" error message paradigms from this "innovative" company.
I own and operate a movie theatre. In common with all other theatres, I make my profit from the concession sales. The price that you pay for the ticket to get in to the show doesn't actually leave anything for "profit".
Then your business model is flawed. Even if this is the same business model used by the rest of the industry, it is still flawed. Everything comes down to value. To me, there is no value in purchasing food at a movie theater, so I don't buy any. The movies themselves often lack any value at any price, so I don't go to see them. On the rare chance that something is worth the matinee price, the half hour or so of commercials before the movie takes the value down a notch. In the end, a $10-15 DVD purchased a year or two after the movie is released will usually be a better value than seeing the movie in a theater, unless you have a particular interest in the movie and absolutely need to see it right away. Whether the reason for high ticket prices and low profit margin is the cost of obtaining the film, the cost of the projectionist, the cost of the facility, the cost of making the movie, the cost of actors, or the cost of the ad campaigns that try to make a piece of garbage look appealing by plastering the movie's name over everything, there is still a lack of value that will keep me from going out to see a movie. As value further decreases, fewer people will go to movies, until only teenagers with handfuls of cash and empty brains are left staring at the screen.
The main problem when dealing with all of these technical/legal issues (legal access to encryption, fair use, privacy, etc.) is that the masses simply don't care. Many people will gladly give up their future rights to ever record a television broadcast again for the chance to watch higher quality (picture-wise, not content-wise) Friends reruns. My question is this - at what point will enough people say "Keep your laws out of my data!" to create a movement that is likely to change the way legislators look at these issues?
True. Let's throw it open to the people: who here has deleted a digital image? And who here has snipped out a particular frame from a roll and thrown it away?
Let's look at the whole situation and not just the tail end of the process. Who here has not taken a picture because of a need to conserve film? And who here has taken more pictures than necessary (including multiple pictures of the exact same scene) simply because they could do so at no additional cost with a digital camera? It isn't just that digital encourages you to shoot more, but that film encourages you to shoot less (at least for non-professional photographers).
Personally, my record for excessive picture taking is 230 pictures during one day of sightseeing. In New Hampshire. Before the leaves turned. On a rainy day. Mostly while visiting big rocks. Sure I deleted 50 or so of those, but only pictures that didn't come out right (blurred, etc.) or were repeated to get the shot right. With a film camera, I wouldn't have taken even half that number (probably closer to 50 total, if that), and some of those probably wouldn't have come out right due to low light or movement. Then the negatives would have been put in a closet and forgotten, one set of prints would go in an album on my bookshelf, and the other would go to my parents. With digital, I have multiple copies on hard drives and CDs, and when I give someone a set of digital pictures on CD, I give them a full CD with all recent sets instead of just the intended set, resulting in a distributed backup system.
The problem isn't with the camera, but with how people use it. I wouldn't think of deleting a good digital picture just because I don't particularly care about what's in it any more than I would burn a negative for the same reason (the obvious exception being that one with the sheep of course). And I don't even delete the pictures from the memory card until they have been copied to at least two different places. Of course, I've been trying to move as much of my life to data as possible in recent years (to make room for other things), so I'm used to doing this sort of thing. People who are new to data handling on this scale will probably make some mistakes, and right now we are seeing the masses go through this phase.
In a few years, once people get bored with GHz ratings and other such technobabble, every idiot will have a corporate-level data management system on their PC (assuming that managing data is still legal of course) because that will be the next big thing. For your benefit, I have reached into the future and pulled out this commercial, aired during the Friends reunion special in 2006.
Tired of spending hours searching through that stack of CDs and DVDs looking for one little file [image of woman in early 30s digging through a huge pile of discs]? Worried about losing your important data [image of small child smashing a disc with "FINANCIAL RECORDS - 2000-2005" written on it]? Then you need Stor-Pro 3000 [splash screen with swirling numbers and product logo]! Stor-Pro 3000 keeps track of all your data, so you'll always know where something is [image of smiling woman pulling a single disc from a stack]. With Stor-Pro 3000, you can automatically produce backups of your important data on removable media [image of smiling father holding duplicate "FINANCIAL RECORDS - 2000-2005" disc while child begins to chew on pieces of other disc] or even beam them to its own custom wireless storage modules! Keep one in your home [image of "waves" coming from small black box with flashing lights on desk], one in your car [image of "waves" hitting small black box with flashing lights in a car], and one at work [image of "waves" hitting same box as before in an office] and all of your data will automatically be backed up in three different locations! And don't worry about evil hackers getting into your private information [image of young man at home PC adding names to text file titled "Babes at work I want to bang"], Stor-Pro 3000 utilizes the strongest encryption the law allows [image of guy in black mask shaking little black box and scratching head]. Act now and we'll throw in our Password Pal password storage software absolutely free [splash screen with swirling letters and product logo]!. With Password Pal, you'll never tear your hair out because you can't remember your password ever again [image of man pulling at hair and banging head on keyboard, flash to man with full head of hair smiling and typing]. Order today and you can get the Stor-Pro 3000 software [blank screen, Stor-Pro CD flashes in], three wireless data storage modules [3 black boxes flash in next to the CD, one at a time], and your free gift, out Password Pal password management software [Password Pal CD flashes in under previous items] for just 3 payments of $99.95 ["$99.95" appears next to items, with "3 payments of" in small type above it]. All of this comes with our 100% money-back guarantee - if you aren't fully satisfied with your purchase, just send the software and data storage modules back for a full refund! Place your order within the next 10 minutes and mention this ad and we'll throw in 25 blank storage discs and this handy carrying case, absolutely free [discs and carrying case appear next to everything else]. Order now! [various terms and conditions are read as payment information appears]
And when email is lost, it isn't buried in a long-forgotten box in a dusty attic somewhere, waiting for someone to stumble on it one day in the future. When email is "lost," it's gone for good.
Well, when my e-mail is "lost," it's on one of the countless backup CDs or old hard drives that will someday end up buried in many different long-forgotten boxes in dusty attics in various places (while the "originals" will be carefully maintained until I either die or move to a small cabin in Montana...). I would really like to know the odds of at least one of these surviving for a given number of years vs. the same odds for original paper letters. But for now, I can rest easy knowing that every digital communication I've ever made is just one court order away from becoming public record. Ok, time to smash some CDs...
3GB digital wallet - $199 on pricewatch
Nomad 32mb mem - $133 on pricewatch
You are paying like $60 more for 2 more GB of storage or mp3 playing or as harddrive. Hmm, $60 can get you 64mb more flash and a few more batteries.
So you're paying $150 more for a slightly smaller size and Firewire (their 6GB Firewire drive (no MP3) is $229), or $30 more for a slightly smaller size and Firewire, with 25% of the space. And your combination, at $60 less (the price of a 128MB flash card and 4 high capacity NiMH AA batteries) can also be used to store digital camera pictures, which is a big advantage. So where's the advantage of the iPod? Sure you can transfer the MP3 files over faster (which you wouldn't be doing frequently anyway), but only if you have an "Apple computer with built-in FireWire port" running "Mac OS 9.2.1 (or later) or Mac OS X v10.1 (or later)." Ok, you can use it as a $229 portable Firewire hard drive, but that is only an advantage if you need a Firewire hard drive and an MP3 player at the same time - otherwise you can get two devices, one for each use (12GB total), for $80 more, or some other combination to fit your needs. So really, this is only a good deal if you specifically need the exact capabilities of this device.
Well, I was hoping for something along the lines of the Terapin Mine, especially after seeing how well the new iBook and TiBook came out, but this thing is destined to fail. For $400 you can get a 5GB MP3 player that will only (officially) work on Macs running the very latest versions of the MacOS, but will run for 10 hours. Or, for half the price, you can get a smaller MP3 player and enough batteries and flash cards to keep most people happy, and which won't depend on the computer you use, and for the rest of the price you could get a low-end 3GB Digital Wallet for more storage. I can't offload my digital pictures to an iPod. I can't move files to any computer I want on an iPod. I can't use standard rechargeable batteries in an iPod. I can't find a reason to buy an iPod.
For example - if I knew that the cause of my headaches was an allergy to certain foods, I could avoid those foods, and not have to take aspirin. If I know how an exploit works, I can prevent it with my own tools - firewall, etc. and not have to worry too much about the dubious patches.
But you're missing the point. Here's another example of Microsoft enlightenment: if your car breaks down on the side of the road, you don't need to know what the problem is in order to swear at it, kick it a few times, set it on fire, and stick your thumb out to hitch a ride, only to get picked up by some sadistic pervert and taken to a shack in the woods, where you are left for dead after he finishes having his way with you. The Microsoft way is to allow your system to be destroyed and then spend more money on Microsoft products (because you have to, not because you want to), repeating the cycle indefinitely. This is how you become a Good Little Consumer, which is what it means to be an American. You aren't un-American, are you?
Come on now, that law does not apply to broadcast programming. If you broadcast a signal in a television or AM or FM band, everyone is entitled to receive your signal... it is part of the terms of your broadcast license.
That section of the communications act is there to protect people who use two-way radio for private communications. Not every law is part of some capitalist corporate conspiracy.
If you had bothered to follow the link I provided to verify the quote, you would have realized that your post is completely incorrect. I know this place just loves unsubstantiated speculation, but I can't stand such blatant and willing ignorance when all you had to do was click on some text. The law I referred to does indeed apply to FM broadcasts in the 88-108MHz frequency band, specifically subcarrier services that are broadcasted freely but are not intended to be received freely (but, like I said, most people have no idea that it exists; I was quite surprised myself when I stumbled across it). The law dictates how technology may be applied to available information, much like the good old DMCA. Of course, the issue of expecting any information transmitted through a public medium to be private is a related but more general matter.
That method of distribution was soon outmoded by radio-- the problem being, of course, that it was damn hard to charge for a broadcast service. But business soon found a way to deal with the situation, and now we can listen to free radio anytime we want.
You left out a critical part of history that most people aren't even aware of - radio stations found a way to charge for radio broadcasts by - get this - outlawing the manufacture, distribution, possession, and use of technology that could allow reception of certain broadcasts:
"...Section 605 of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, which states that no one may receive, or assist in receiving, any radio communication to which they are not entitled and use that information for their own benefit. In addition, 18 U.S.C. Sections 2510 through 2521 prohibit the manufacture, assembly, possession, and sale of any device primarily useful for the surreptitious interception of such radio transmissions." http://www.fcc.gov/mmb/asd/subcarriers/sub.html
Sheesh, ask a serious and on-topic question (How can a question about Wil Wheaton under "Ask Wil Wheaton Anything" be considered offtopic?) and get modded down as an offtopic troll...
I suppose I would have been modded up if I had asked something vague and unimportant (and Star Trek related) like "After the recent terrorist attacks on the US and the US military response, do you believe that the idealistic peace portrayed in the Star Trek future is more likely or less likely to be in our future?"
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LPFM isn't dead, it's just somewhat crippled, in a coma, and horribly disfigured. The NAB and NPR, among others, cried "Interference!" (their "examples" and "studies" are quite amusing) and bought a bill requiring interference testing to be carried out by a qualified company not associated with broadcasters or the government (which pretty much eliminates everyone). An interesting provision in this bill is the requirement for an economic impact analysis, which could be interpreted as how big stations could lose money if LPFM stations provide the content people want (it could also be interpreted as only pertaining to the impact of an increase in interference, which makes more sense). Despite these problems, LPFM interference testing is on track to take place sometime next year.
The real problem isn't the stalling (testing), but the licensing. Current pirate operators were given amnesty a few years ago if they ceased operations. Since legal LPFM isn't up and running yet (and probably won't be for a while), this amnesty period was a waste. Now, any currently functioning pirate station is ineligible for a legal license - they have no choice but to continue operating illegally or shut down completely. Groups eligible for LPFM licenses only include non-profit groups without current media ties (no small newspapers, etc.). Additional restrictions and licensing selectivity resulted in the majority of the 250 or so LPFM licenses approved so far going to religious groups. So much for general interest local programming.
LPFM was a nice idea, but it just isn't going to happen in a band populated by extremely large broadcasting conglomerates (thank you deregulation...). The spectrum belongs to the public just like the government works for the public - not much.
I tried to stay awake through the whole thing, but I failed. The swirling colors and lack of dialogue put me under right away. I just wish I had been that lucky with Insurrection, but I seem to have blocked out those memories, so perhaps all is well after all.
I'm really getting sick of the amount of computer generated effects being used in entertainment these days. The Matrix seems to be the starting point of this widespread overuse, but at least it fit with the story in that movie. Commercials for Charlie's Angels, The Musketeer, Pearl Harbor, Behind Enemy Lines, and everything Jet Li has been in lately were full of these kinds of effects, and I just don't see the appeal. Call me old fashioned, but I'll take Black Sheep Squadron's mix of stock footage, combat footage, and cockpit views over a computer generated plane any day. I liked Robert Picardo better as a singing doctor in Vietnam than as a singing holographic doctor on a starship. Large scale CG has its place in historical recreations for documentaries, but it is a poor substitute for plot and character development.
With that said, you can probably figure out how I feel about these computer generated celebrities. I'm not a big fan of human celebrities, so I'm not too excited about the CG kind. Physical presence is the one feature most "celebrities" are reduced to relying on - what will be left when that is taken away? Hopefully this "next big thing" will be the next big flop.
The reason why this will eventually be accepted (assuming there is no serious risk to the athlete of course) is simple - sporting events are entertainment. If records are never broken, nobody cares. In 1997, baseball was no big deal. In 1998, there was a huge peak in interest because a record that had stood for decades was about to be broken. However, frequent record breaking is just as boring as no record breaking at all, as was shown by the general lack of interest in the last weekend of the 2001 MLB season, which featured all kinds of records falling. What does this mean about the future of genetically enhanced sports? At first, people will be amazed at the superhuman feats. Then it will get boring. Finally, it will be interesting again, if anyone still cares about sports enough to participate at the media-hyped level.
...they might as well use the information they gather to set up a dating service. Think about it - the government spies on your every keystroke, but to make up for it they send the sexual partner(s) of your dreams to your door. How many people will still be complaining here after that. "Damn government helping me get laid... Oh well, gotta go, no time to bitch and moan about the complete erosion of civil liberties, I'm gonna get me some." It gives new meaning to the term "public relations..."
So now that EULA resale restrictions and message board libel are out, what's next? Will CA rule that Microsoft should be punished and not rewarded for its crimes? Will it take a swing at the DMCA? Will a massive earthquake send it to the bottom of the ocean? (Ok, so that one isn't exactly related, but it is probably just as likely...)
What do you see as being the future of digital media: a business model based on consumers having little or no control over the information they pay for and consumers willing to put up with this, or something more similar to traditional rules where a company has little control over its product once it is sold, digital or otherwise?
Except there aren't any additional IP addresses being used. And of course, as with most speculative damages, this fails to take into consideration the fact that many of these additional computers would not be networked for internet access at $5 per month if there were no "free" alternative available. Consumers gaining functionality does not automatically equate to companies losing profits, especially if the service offered is not the one desired (IP addresses vs. just a data pipe).
With NAT-based hubs, cable providers won't be able to see into all connected devices-making remote troubleshooting difficult-because, again, the NAT is speaking for all connected devices.
Oh no, my cable company won't be able to mess around with the equipment without my knowledge. I'm so worried.
CAT could replace NAT altogether, at least in equipment hand-picked by MSOs for home-network service packages. ... At the very least, cable MSOs involved in CableHome want a counting mechanism, with parameters set by them, that specifies a maximum number of connected devices.
Um, why should my cable company be able to penalize me for having devices that aren't routinely (or ever) used for internet access? So I guess I'll need NAT in the CAT... This whole article is one big piece of misinformation and FUD. My cable company doesn't need to know what I have on my private network - they provide the pipe, I use it. They might be able to monitor some of the data that goes through their network, but anything more invades my privacy (ethical argument, not legal argument) and puts my network at risk of attack. NAT will be around until the cable companies buy a law banning it, and then it will still be around illegally.
This is true with any government. Really. Just trust me.
Sure, I'll trust you just as much as I trust the Saudi Arabian government. Unless you have a link to the international law that guarantees the right to internet access for all human beings, I will be forced to write this off as a misguided attempt at humor on your part.
Although, this would explain a few things...
"Mr. President, the Taliban is guilty of numerous human rights violations, should we bomb them?"
"So is China, but we seem to be getting along fine with those fellows, let's just wait and see with these folks."
"Now they're destroying ancient statues of tremendous archeological and religious significance!"
"That could just be a misunderstanding, let's give them the benefit of the doubt for now."
"Oh yeah, and they made it illegal for their people to access the internet."
"What? Those bastards! Get the bombers in the air, I want to be watching stuff blow up on CNN by lunchtime."
Seriously though, instead of looking at things from the "Information wants to be free ... or else." perspective, let's start with no access as the reference point. Ok, so these governments are so insecure that they don't trust their people with information about bombs or the water supply or... Oh, sorry, wrong country. Where were we? Right, Saudi Arabia and that bunch. So these governments don't like new ideas. Like it or not, these are independent entities outside the US (or whatever country you are associated with). We can't just go around trying to enforce our laws inside their borders. Wait, sorry about that, apparently we can... Ok, this is getting confusing. The point here is that if a government wants to block information from its people, that's an internal matter for that particular country. We can't force every country to allow access to all information any more than you can demand that your neighbors teach their children all about homosexuality, witchcraft, or Linux. As for American countries selling the tools to block information, they sell the tools that allow your neighbors to block similar information from their children. In both cases, these are areas outside your control, regardless of your opinion on the matter. If your hypothetical neighbors (different ones this time) were forcing their children to participate in the creation of child pornography, you can't just go over there and start beating them up - only the proper authorities can intervene. You can forbid your children from visiting them, you can stop inviting them to your backyard barbecues, and you can refuse to buy those overpriced candy bars that their kids keep selling, but that's about all you can do directly, just like the US isn't in a position to force other governments to treat their people fairly (not that this has ever stopped the US government, but in theory...) - that's a job for a global governmental body.
On the bright side, at least the people in these countries have some access to the internet. Without these "filtering" systems, there might just be a Taliban-style ban (of course, that could be on the way, but taking things away tends to upset people more than not giving them something they never had in the first place). Whether or not that is acceptable is up to the people in those countries, not us. We can't just force our way over there and impose our values on them (well, we could, but that sort of thing doesn't usually go over too well), and we can't ban companies from helping other countries do something we allow our citizens to do to people under their control (again, we could, but that wouldn't make much sense, not that export controls have to make sense). What was the question again? Was there even a point in the first place other than the whole misguided "information wants to be free" type of complaining about limiting access to information?
"Captain, Saudi Arabia is decloaking off the starboard router!"
There are just so many things wrong with this statement... Do you want "radically different interfaces" just for the sake of being different, or do you want them to be functional too? And of course, "radically different" and "widespread acceptance" very rarely go together. Most people accept what is familiar, so none of these new interfaces are going to take off overnight. While we're at it though, why don't we have radically different automobile interfaces, or radically different food packaging interfaces, or radically different building access interfaces?
The whole point of an interface is that it is accessible. The key here is to make it work for the users and not make the users work for it. When you start having the interface share some of the work of organizing files (as Scopeware does), you may take some work away from the user, but now you've essentially got a co-worker you need to deal with whenever you want a file. Imagine two people sharing a cubicle (yes, this is a desktop metaphor for a non-desktop metaphor replacing a desktop metaphor), using the same files and reference materials. Even if one is only tasked with organizing everything, there's still a gap between the brain of the user and the brain of the organizer. If there isn't a perfect match between how the two think, you'll hit an endless cycle of problems. The only solution is to either force the user to conform to the organizer, or customize the organizer to the exact specifications of the user. Neither is likely to be better than just giving the user the task of organizer.
All of these nifty high-tech interfaces may be fun to play with and may succeed at getting funding, but their final test is always the typical user. Now, I know the typical user is held in low regard around here (we are the elite after all, or at least we like to think we are), but at some point you have to interact with reality. The desktop metaphor just won't die for a reason - people can use it. As an IBM researcher said in the article, "We wanted to find people who didn't understand the function of file folders, how to open files, how to delete files. We couldn't find anyone." Throw some weird abstract 3-D creation at people, and some won't understand. A lot of people can't even handle the concept of multiple ways of completing a given task; increasing the complexity of the interface would actually make things more difficult for them.
The real solution to this problem won't come from the interface side - it will come from the user side. You can't design an interface until you can understand what the user wants to do. This may not be as attractive a project for venture capital, but reality seldom is. In the end, I have a feeling that there will be no general agreements between users, making a single unified advanced interface impractical.
Yet again, the solution is on the user end. The desktop metaphor is a lot more useful than many people give it credit for. For example, the paragraph describing Scopeware really describes a generic file search program that already works perfectly well in a desktop metaphor. However, expanding it to fill the entire GUI is pointless. If you want to be able to find something, just put it somewhere that makes sense. In a year or two, will you really remember what day, or even what month you last used a certain file? If you file it away in a logical place though, you can use that same logic to locate the file again. Instead of file-specific knowledge, all you need to know is how you think. Sure this requires you to think in the first place, but that is the key issue here. In any interface, usefulness will be determined by how well files are maintained by the user. The current desktop metaphor requires very little from the user, just moving files around. Linked interfaces or fancy 3-D interfaces require more from the user, otherwise there will be no benefits - you still have to create the links or move files around spatially. If managing a system of files and folders is too much work for some people, will these new interfaces be any better?
So for those of you who survived this entire comment, I will sum up how to improve the computer interface for the masses. Teach them how to get the most out of the existing interface, based on their individual needs. Learn where they run into problems caused by the interface. Refine the interface to the point where the user is truly in control and isn't restricted by how the interface thinks things should be done - leave the thinking to the humans. We don't need any fancy interfaces on a general purpose computer. And yes Apple, that means cut it out with all the prettying up/cluttering up of the GUI. Just make it work and leave it alone.
vivendisucksuniversal.com
Or, for the more creative types:
vivendisucksuniversally.com
Would non-English speakers be confused and think this is a Vivendi Universal site? And if some would be confused, would it just be really stupid non-English speakers who automatically assume that any domain containing the strings "vivendi" and "universal" must be official Vivendi Universal sites? At what point does individual stupidity become the responsibility of the individual and not the domain owner?
...when it comes to error messages. That green-on-black look alone is "hip" and "trendy," but the attention to detail shows that Microsoft has put a lot of effort into making the user's error message experience an enjoyable one. In the future, I'm sure we can look forward to more "dynamic" and "interactive" error message paradigms from this "innovative" company.
Then your business model is flawed. Even if this is the same business model used by the rest of the industry, it is still flawed. Everything comes down to value. To me, there is no value in purchasing food at a movie theater, so I don't buy any. The movies themselves often lack any value at any price, so I don't go to see them. On the rare chance that something is worth the matinee price, the half hour or so of commercials before the movie takes the value down a notch. In the end, a $10-15 DVD purchased a year or two after the movie is released will usually be a better value than seeing the movie in a theater, unless you have a particular interest in the movie and absolutely need to see it right away. Whether the reason for high ticket prices and low profit margin is the cost of obtaining the film, the cost of the projectionist, the cost of the facility, the cost of making the movie, the cost of actors, or the cost of the ad campaigns that try to make a piece of garbage look appealing by plastering the movie's name over everything, there is still a lack of value that will keep me from going out to see a movie. As value further decreases, fewer people will go to movies, until only teenagers with handfuls of cash and empty brains are left staring at the screen.
The main problem when dealing with all of these technical/legal issues (legal access to encryption, fair use, privacy, etc.) is that the masses simply don't care. Many people will gladly give up their future rights to ever record a television broadcast again for the chance to watch higher quality (picture-wise, not content-wise) Friends reruns. My question is this - at what point will enough people say "Keep your laws out of my data!" to create a movement that is likely to change the way legislators look at these issues?
Let's look at the whole situation and not just the tail end of the process. Who here has not taken a picture because of a need to conserve film? And who here has taken more pictures than necessary (including multiple pictures of the exact same scene) simply because they could do so at no additional cost with a digital camera? It isn't just that digital encourages you to shoot more, but that film encourages you to shoot less (at least for non-professional photographers).
Personally, my record for excessive picture taking is 230 pictures during one day of sightseeing. In New Hampshire. Before the leaves turned. On a rainy day. Mostly while visiting big rocks. Sure I deleted 50 or so of those, but only pictures that didn't come out right (blurred, etc.) or were repeated to get the shot right. With a film camera, I wouldn't have taken even half that number (probably closer to 50 total, if that), and some of those probably wouldn't have come out right due to low light or movement. Then the negatives would have been put in a closet and forgotten, one set of prints would go in an album on my bookshelf, and the other would go to my parents. With digital, I have multiple copies on hard drives and CDs, and when I give someone a set of digital pictures on CD, I give them a full CD with all recent sets instead of just the intended set, resulting in a distributed backup system.
The problem isn't with the camera, but with how people use it. I wouldn't think of deleting a good digital picture just because I don't particularly care about what's in it any more than I would burn a negative for the same reason (the obvious exception being that one with the sheep of course). And I don't even delete the pictures from the memory card until they have been copied to at least two different places. Of course, I've been trying to move as much of my life to data as possible in recent years (to make room for other things), so I'm used to doing this sort of thing. People who are new to data handling on this scale will probably make some mistakes, and right now we are seeing the masses go through this phase.
In a few years, once people get bored with GHz ratings and other such technobabble, every idiot will have a corporate-level data management system on their PC (assuming that managing data is still legal of course) because that will be the next big thing. For your benefit, I have reached into the future and pulled out this commercial, aired during the Friends reunion special in 2006.
Tired of spending hours searching through that stack of CDs and DVDs looking for one little file [image of woman in early 30s digging through a huge pile of discs]? Worried about losing your important data [image of small child smashing a disc with "FINANCIAL RECORDS - 2000-2005" written on it]? Then you need Stor-Pro 3000 [splash screen with swirling numbers and product logo]! Stor-Pro 3000 keeps track of all your data, so you'll always know where something is [image of smiling woman pulling a single disc from a stack]. With Stor-Pro 3000, you can automatically produce backups of your important data on removable media [image of smiling father holding duplicate "FINANCIAL RECORDS - 2000-2005" disc while child begins to chew on pieces of other disc] or even beam them to its own custom wireless storage modules! Keep one in your home [image of "waves" coming from small black box with flashing lights on desk], one in your car [image of "waves" hitting small black box with flashing lights in a car], and one at work [image of "waves" hitting same box as before in an office] and all of your data will automatically be backed up in three different locations! And don't worry about evil hackers getting into your private information [image of young man at home PC adding names to text file titled "Babes at work I want to bang"], Stor-Pro 3000 utilizes the strongest encryption the law allows [image of guy in black mask shaking little black box and scratching head]. Act now and we'll throw in our Password Pal password storage software absolutely free [splash screen with swirling letters and product logo]!. With Password Pal, you'll never tear your hair out because you can't remember your password ever again [image of man pulling at hair and banging head on keyboard, flash to man with full head of hair smiling and typing]. Order today and you can get the Stor-Pro 3000 software [blank screen, Stor-Pro CD flashes in], three wireless data storage modules [3 black boxes flash in next to the CD, one at a time], and your free gift, out Password Pal password management software [Password Pal CD flashes in under previous items] for just 3 payments of $99.95 ["$99.95" appears next to items, with "3 payments of" in small type above it]. All of this comes with our 100% money-back guarantee - if you aren't fully satisfied with your purchase, just send the software and data storage modules back for a full refund! Place your order within the next 10 minutes and mention this ad and we'll throw in 25 blank storage discs and this handy carrying case, absolutely free [discs and carrying case appear next to everything else]. Order now! [various terms and conditions are read as payment information appears]
Well, when my e-mail is "lost," it's on one of the countless backup CDs or old hard drives that will someday end up buried in many different long-forgotten boxes in dusty attics in various places (while the "originals" will be carefully maintained until I either die or move to a small cabin in Montana...). I would really like to know the odds of at least one of these surviving for a given number of years vs. the same odds for original paper letters. But for now, I can rest easy knowing that every digital communication I've ever made is just one court order away from becoming public record. Ok, time to smash some CDs...
iPod: 2.4x4x.78 at 6.5oz
I'll give up a gig for size and weight
iPod 5GB: 4" x 2.4" x .78" at 6.5oz, $400
Archos 6GB: 4.5" x 3.2" x 1.3" at 12oz, $250
Archos 20GB: 4.5" x 3.2" x 1.3" at 12oz, $370
Just how much is that size/weight difference worth to you?
Nomad 32mb mem - $133 on pricewatch
You are paying like $60 more for 2 more GB of storage or mp3 playing or as harddrive. Hmm, $60 can get you 64mb more flash and a few more batteries.
Archos 6GB MP3 Player/USB hard drive - $249 from the manufacturer
Archos 20GB MP3 Player/USB hard drive - $369 from the manufacturer
So you're paying $150 more for a slightly smaller size and Firewire (their 6GB Firewire drive (no MP3) is $229), or $30 more for a slightly smaller size and Firewire, with 25% of the space. And your combination, at $60 less (the price of a 128MB flash card and 4 high capacity NiMH AA batteries) can also be used to store digital camera pictures, which is a big advantage. So where's the advantage of the iPod? Sure you can transfer the MP3 files over faster (which you wouldn't be doing frequently anyway), but only if you have an "Apple computer with built-in FireWire port" running "Mac OS 9.2.1 (or later) or Mac OS X v10.1 (or later)." Ok, you can use it as a $229 portable Firewire hard drive, but that is only an advantage if you need a Firewire hard drive and an MP3 player at the same time - otherwise you can get two devices, one for each use (12GB total), for $80 more, or some other combination to fit your needs. So really, this is only a good deal if you specifically need the exact capabilities of this device.
Well, I was hoping for something along the lines of the Terapin Mine, especially after seeing how well the new iBook and TiBook came out, but this thing is destined to fail. For $400 you can get a 5GB MP3 player that will only (officially) work on Macs running the very latest versions of the MacOS, but will run for 10 hours. Or, for half the price, you can get a smaller MP3 player and enough batteries and flash cards to keep most people happy, and which won't depend on the computer you use, and for the rest of the price you could get a low-end 3GB Digital Wallet for more storage. I can't offload my digital pictures to an iPod. I can't move files to any computer I want on an iPod. I can't use standard rechargeable batteries in an iPod. I can't find a reason to buy an iPod.
But you're missing the point. Here's another example of Microsoft enlightenment: if your car breaks down on the side of the road, you don't need to know what the problem is in order to swear at it, kick it a few times, set it on fire, and stick your thumb out to hitch a ride, only to get picked up by some sadistic pervert and taken to a shack in the woods, where you are left for dead after he finishes having his way with you. The Microsoft way is to allow your system to be destroyed and then spend more money on Microsoft products (because you have to, not because you want to), repeating the cycle indefinitely. This is how you become a Good Little Consumer, which is what it means to be an American. You aren't un-American, are you?
That section of the communications act is there to protect people who use two-way radio for private communications. Not every law is part of some capitalist corporate conspiracy.
If you had bothered to follow the link I provided to verify the quote, you would have realized that your post is completely incorrect. I know this place just loves unsubstantiated speculation, but I can't stand such blatant and willing ignorance when all you had to do was click on some text. The law I referred to does indeed apply to FM broadcasts in the 88-108MHz frequency band, specifically subcarrier services that are broadcasted freely but are not intended to be received freely (but, like I said, most people have no idea that it exists; I was quite surprised myself when I stumbled across it). The law dictates how technology may be applied to available information, much like the good old DMCA. Of course, the issue of expecting any information transmitted through a public medium to be private is a related but more general matter.
You left out a critical part of history that most people aren't even aware of - radio stations found a way to charge for radio broadcasts by - get this - outlawing the manufacture, distribution, possession, and use of technology that could allow reception of certain broadcasts:
"...Section 605 of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended, which states that no one may receive, or assist in receiving, any radio communication to which they are not entitled and use that information for their own benefit. In addition, 18 U.S.C. Sections 2510 through 2521 prohibit the manufacture, assembly, possession, and sale of any device primarily useful for the surreptitious interception of such radio transmissions."
http://www.fcc.gov/mmb/asd/subcarriers/sub.html
Sheesh, ask a serious and on-topic question (How can a question about Wil Wheaton under "Ask Wil Wheaton Anything" be considered offtopic?) and get modded down as an offtopic troll...
I suppose I would have been modded up if I had asked something vague and unimportant (and Star Trek related) like "After the recent terrorist attacks on the US and the US military response, do you believe that the idealistic peace portrayed in the Star Trek future is more likely or less likely to be in our future?"